A body 4 speed in a truck. Can this be done?

alpha13 said

I've got an A body 4 speed OD under the bench in the garage that has been begging me to do something with it. Has anyone every installed one in a truck? In a perfect world a Truck 4 speed would be a direct swap. However, this is what I've got to work with. Would the shifter come out of the floor too far forward? If so, do you suppose I could just build a custom shifter with a few funky bends to clear the dash? Has anyone done this? Thanks.

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833s came in trucks from the factory, guessing mid-late 70s (a bit out of my wheelhouse, so I can't tell you the exact years), so all the factory hardware is available. They used a fiberglass floor hump for the shifter. They used the long tail shaft (B,C,E body) transmission though- not sure if the trucks used the forward or rear shifter mounts on those. But the bellhousings and clutch linkages are out there for them.
You didn't say what year truck you're putting it in, if it's a later truck with hydraulic pedals and linkage, you'll most likely need to swap it all out to the earlier mechanical linkage to work with the truck 833 bellhousing.
The good news is if you can make the A body shifter location work for you (it's about midway between the short and long pads of the long tail trans), you can just make up the length difference with the driveshaft. The trans mount pad is in the same location whether it's a long or short tail transmission.